


time does not bring relief

by queerwatson



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/F, Time Loop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 03:40:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3275327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queerwatson/pseuds/queerwatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane Watson and Sherlock Holmes knew each other once already. Jane bumps into Sherlock in the park, lets her get away, and then moments later realizes she's died in a car accident. And then Jane Watson wakes up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	time does not bring relief

**Author's Note:**

> So since the major character death here is temporary I've chosen not to tag for it, but that is something to be wary of. Title credit to Edna St. Vincent Millay, as is so often the case.

It was a Wednesday. Like any other Wednesday since Jane had gotten back from Afghanistan, really. She’d gone for a walk in Russell Square Gardens, since it was close enough to her shit bedsit and she always felt better if she went outside at least once a day.  
  
The issue, though, was that it wasn’t just a normal Wednesday.  
  
The issue, though, was that while walking her usual path, Jane ran headfirst into Sherlock Holmes.  
  
All of a sudden, Jane was back in secondary school. She had met Sherlock there, god, twenty or so years ago now. Sherlock had transferred in, having been kicked out of somewhere else, but Jane had only found that out after getting to know her. They’d run into each other in the hallway almost just like this, Jane had helped Sherlock pick up her books, Sherlock had deduced Jane then and there, and they’d been friends from then on. Of course Jane had fallen arse over teakettle in love with her, and they had actually dated briefly, but Sherlock had broken it off before she changed schools - it was before teenagers had cellphones and well before facebook, so there’d been no good way for them to keep in touch. There’d been letters, but they had dropped off eventually.

Now, here she was, brushing shoulders with Jane and still staring down at her phone. Jane turned, and opened her mouth, but didn’t know what to say. Sherlock hadn’t noticed her at all. She looked down at her own cane, considered her casual outfit in comparison to the striking figure Sherlock cut in that long black coat, and remembered the grey at her temples she still hadn’t touched up, and she bit her tongue. Sherlock kept going, and walked out of view.

Jane stood there, in the middle of the park, feeling more than a little pathetic.

Then, all of a sudden, there was a crashing sound. A terrible one. One that made Jane’s heart feel like it had stopped its beating for a moment. Her cane fell, and she ran towards the sound, fearing what she might see.

She caught sight of a car crash, and the ends of a long black coat tangled up in the fray.  
  
Her heart skipped again.

Then, suddenly, Jane Watson woke up with a gasp.

\---

It had been a dream, then. A very startling, unusual dream. Whether it was better or worse than her usual nightmares was debatable - hard to compare one sickening heart-stopping fear and the pain that came with it to another.

She pushed herself out of bed and made her way over to her desk. She opened her laptop. Eerily enough, the date in the corner told her it was Wednesday. She tried not to think about it.

Once Jane pulled up her internet browser, though, she paused. What had happened to Sherlock Holmes? The name was unusual enough. Surely a google search could tell her something.

Sure enough, she typed in the name, and a website popped up.

A detective. For some reason, Jane wasn’t surprised. She smiled.

There was an address on the page, one on Montague Street, but Jane didn’t want to just pop up out of nowhere and seem like a creep. ‘I had a dream where you died last night’ wasn’t exactly the way you wanted to greet an ex you wanted to reconnect with. She did see an email address on the page, though. Though she felt a little odd about it, Jane opened up her own email account, and typed up a short little something to send to Sherlock.  
  


_To:_ [ _sherlock.holmes@gmail.com_ ](mailto:sherlock.holmes@gmail.com)

_Subject: Hello from an old friend_

 

_Hi! I’ve got no clue if you remember me, but my name’s Jane Watson. We knew each other in secondary school? You went to Ardingly for a while. Anyways, I thought I’d google you and I found your website. I’m glad to know you’re still using that brilliant brain of yours. I bet you’re great at what you do!_

_I only recently got back from Afghanistan, but I’m in London and I see you are, too. I was wondering if maybe you’d like to get coffee together and catch up sometime? Just let me know!_

_-JW_

 

She sent the email, and then stayed stationary at her desk for a bit. There was no immediate response, and still Jane tried to soothe her own frayed nerves. Prophetic dreams were a bunch of bullshit, especially in this case. The dream had at least convinced her not to go to the park that day, though, so after a bit Jane got up and made herself some tea and toast, then settled in at her laptop for a day of looking at job applications and silly cat videos.

Later in the day, though, Jane checked her email and saw she’d gotten a response. She smiled at first, then caught sight of something in the response that made cold dread settle in the pit of her stomach.

After the moment of pain and shock, she read through it properly.  
  


_To:_ [ _jwatson77@hotmail.com_ ](mailto:jwatson77@hotmail.com)

_Subject: Re:Hello from an old friend_

 

_Ms. Watson,_

_It is my regret to inform you that Ms. Holmes was killed in an accident this morning. As many of her emails come from clients I’ve been going through to let all of them know, and thought that perhaps you would like to be notified as well._

_My condolences._

 

There was no note on who the email was from, but Jane didn’t have much time to think about it.

Instead, another time, Jane Watson woke up with a gasp.

\---

One weird dream was one thing. Waking up twice in a row like that, with two dreams that seemed to be telling her the same thing, that was enough to scare the shit out of Jane and make her at least try to do something about it. Getting out of bed, she checked her laptop for the address, and then went to change her clothes. She put on something fairly nice, put on a bit of makeup, because the extra time helped gather her nerves a bit, and then she went out to the street and caught a cab to Montague St.

Once at the address, Jane made her way to the door and knocked. There was only a moment’s wait before someone answered.

Only it wasn’t Sherlock.

It was a disgruntled looking woman, frowning, her arms crossed.

Jane blinked.

“Ah. I’m looking for Sherlock Holmes?”

The woman scoffed and looked absolutely disgusted. “If you’re another one of those fucking clients, you should know she got kicked out two days ago. I’m sick of telling people this. She’s got to change that fucking address on her website. I’m still cleaning the acid off the walls, I’m not dealing with this as well."

The door was slammed in Jane’s face before she could ask where Sherlock might be now. Panic started to set in. Limping to the street, she called another cab, and went to the park.

Except this time, she felt the cab swerve, heard the sickening thump, felt herself thrown forward, heard the crunch.

For the third time, she woke up.

\---

That was quite enough. Jane got out of bed quickly. She got dressed again, put on makeup again, took her cane and went straight to the park.

There she sat, on a bench, and she watched the people walking along the pathway in front of her.

Maybe she’d finally snapped completely under the weight of all her preexisting issues, but something was going on. Jane wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but she didn’t really care either. It was obvious that even if this was another dream, she had to stop what was happening before she could get any sleep again. After a bit, she saw Sherlock walking her way, stood up, and said “Sherlock,” loudly enough to be heard.

Sure enough, Sherlock glanced up from her phone, looking even more gorgeous than Jane had remembered, and she stopped walking.

Jane watched Sherlock blink several times, then look around and move out of the way of the other people walking.

“Jane?”

Oh. So Sherlock did remember her. Jane smiled. “Yeah! Ah. Hello. I wasn’t sure you’d remember me, actually.”

Sherlock still seemed slightly stunned. It was adorable. She really had aged well. “Of course I remember you, why would I have forgotten you? That would be ridiculous.”

Laughing a little, Jane stepped closer. “Well we only knew each other about a year, nearly twenty years ago. But I’m glad I had as much of an impact on you as you did on me.”

A light pink flush spread over Sherlock’s cheeks, which was really a sight to see.

Then, the noise of a car crash came from the same direction it had every other time.

Sherlock startled a bit, and Jane stumbled forward in alarm, grabbing Sherlock’s arm, perhaps a bit too tightly. She loosened her grip after only a moment, but Sherlock still gave her a look of concern.

“I just. Ah. Unexpected loud noises.”

After giving her a once-over, Sherlock nodded. “PTSD.”

Jane swallowed, and nodded, even though it wasn’t entirely the truth. She did have PTSD after all. That bit wasn’t wrong.

“Would you like to go and see if you can help? You are a doctor.”

Looking up at Sherlock’s face, Jane shook her head, still feeling shaken and pale. “I’m not sure I’d be much use right now. Should I-“

“That man over there is calling emergency services. I’m sure they’ll be here quickly enough. You do look shaken. We could go to that coffee shop over there, keep an eye on things. You could get some tea, to settle your nerves.”

Jane relaxed a little, and gave Sherlock a small, grateful smile. “Yeah. That would be good. Thank you.”

With a nod, Sherlock started walking towards the coffee shop, but didn’t shake Jane off her arm. In fact, she deliberately walked with a pace Jane could keep up with.

“We’ve got quite a bit of catching up to do, I can see. You went into the military after all. And did become a doctor.”

“And you became a detective.” Sherlock paused and looked at her with raised eyebrows. Jane smiled. “I looked you up the other night. Found your website and was planning to get in touch.”

Sherlock glanced towards the accident, and Jane did too - it actually looked like there wasn’t anyone hurt. Just a small cab accident. No serious harm.

“This was quite a coincidence then.”

Jane tightened her grip on Sherlock’s arm again, just barely, and swallowed. “Yeah, I suppose it was.”

\---

The next day, Jane woke up, checked her cellphone, and it was Thursday.

It was going to be a good Thursday, too.

She was going to go and look at a flat with Sherlock Holmes.

**Author's Note:**

> Basically what happened here is for Femslash February i’ve made my own trope bingo card and to start off I closed my eyes and pointed at two tropes on the card and wrote a fic to put them together. So here we have time loop plus reunited exes. Hopefully there'll be a lot more of this sort of thing to come as the month goes on.


End file.
